Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1887-11-03
THE Revised Speech as it appears in the Atlanta
Constitution, October 29
GENERAL JACKSON'S SPEECH

WHAT he SAID TO THE CONFEDERATE VETERANS AT
THE FAIR ON WEDNESDAY.
Below we publish the eloquent and patriotic
address delivered by General Henry R. Jackson
before the Confederate veterans in Macon OF
Wednesday. General Jackson was introduced
by Colonel W. j. Northen, and said:
CONFEDERATE VETERANS: To-day
there stsnds upon the soil OF Georgia the dis
tinguished Mississippian who, within the life OF
the present generation, was prisoner in irons
the so-called "traitor" leader of so-cslled
'lost" couse. We, Confederate veterans, relict
of the armies which fought for that cause, are
here to meet him; to move before him in the
pride aad pomp of no Roman triumph, it is
true, but bending our necks to no Roman yoke
Of subjugation. By invitation OF the state OF
Georgia, speaking through her duly empowered
officials, all have come. Behold majestic truth
revealing herself. State sovereignty is not
dead. Georgia is Il sovereign still, and calls
upon her people to glory with her to- day. Herr
glory is in her history; her history is in the
memory OF her dead; and this day is cousccrate
to her Confederate dead. They were guilty oil
no treason to her. To whom, then, could thev
he traitors? Where shall We seek their higher
sovereign? Shall we fiud him in the Fedora
constitution? Then there was d sovereign
smitten to earth BY traitor hands, trampIed in
the dust by traitor feet; but the hands and the
feet were not theirs. Do we hold that the men
who fought against them were traitors? Not at
all not at all They, too, were loyal to their
sovereigns. The constitution was but G treaty.
most solemn, by-oath-upon stamp
ed compact, it is true; and yet at last but Il
treaty between high contracting sovereign par
ties, without one atom of sovereignty in itself.
Hence, with impunity, through long years OF
painful agitation, was it broken, broken by the
sovereign parties of the North. Called often
times "a compact with he'll" they enacted into
crime the mere attempt of Federal power to
enforce it within their dominions. And be-
cause, after decades, of endurance as patient as
it was delusive, the sovereign parties Of the
South declined to accept their revolutionary
will in permanent place of the constitution, the
compact breaking sovereigns-of the North, with
numbers overwhelming and "material" un-
bounded, made aggressive war upon them to
force them to accept it. Simple record this;
yet forever fixed in the armament Of truth. |
Falsehood abread, reckless or malignant; daily |
ing with the false at home, ill-iudged, cowardly
or veual can not unfx 1t. As well attempt, |
standing upon stool, to pluck fixed star
from heaven.
The world has been told that the people of
the SOath made the war to perpetuate African |
slavery. This is false They did not create |
that institution, nor do they now wish to restore
it, Not that shame can attach to its memory. |
False, indeed, must be the historic muse to her
clearest duty, if, all things being fairly con-
sidered-the parties, the surroundings, the re-
suts-she fail to hand it down to future times
AZ the gentlest, and by far the most ciyilizing |
and humanizng relationship ever borne by
labor or capital.
The people in the South few to arms not to
but to imperil their peculiar insti-
tuition; not to save, but to sacrifice property in
defence Of honor; nay, to sacrifice life itself
rather than tamely submit TO insolent wrong
For the right to govern themselves, begueathed
to them by their fathers, they were prepared to
immediate all. The principle for which they
fought-the only principle of government ex-
pansive enough to meet the requirements OF ad- !
vancng civilization, made oflate by Gladstone's
eloquerce so familiar to European thought, was
American-bOrn. Sun of the modern as COM
pared with the ancient civilization; "home-
rule" as contrasted with Roman Capitalization,
it rose in the West and now mounts the western
ornament red with the hood of Confederate /
heroes moist with the tears of Confederate
tinue to roll, carrying with it the blessed light (!
of the Christian civilization all round the gol @.
And so surely as it moves, it shall bring the
day of final triumph, to be decreed by the
mind and conscience of man to time-tested
truth. In that triumphal procession Abraham
Lincoln shall not move Us the rishtful Presi-
dent, but Jefferson Davis, the so-called
traitor leader of so-caled "lost cause"
The memory OF those chains will thrill along
that awful line with power never given to NOR
tai eioquence. In that silent but maj jestic
march will move ''the Confederate States OF
America each wearing her truth-studded
crown ofsovereignty untarnished; GeOrgia bear
ing in her proud arms her Barlow, her Cobb,
her Walker, her bloOd-stained heroes unnum-
bered, who fell with sense of the coming
glory uneclipsed in their souls.
Ii this be the coming of "the New South, "
name which ocrn Jies the air at times, then we,
Confederate veterans, CRY, New South, all hail
Do we not, mY brothers? All hail renovated
union of sovereign states as planned by the
common fathers, who worked more wisely
than they knew" All hail, grand American
Republic of wheels within wheel; resplendent
illuminaior of the modern world We, we, too,
COnfederates, Can echo from our hearts and
re-echo from our heart of hearts, the patriot
cry of Webster the Great Thanks be to God
that l, l, too, am an American citizen"
But, if the so-called New South be base
of the old, a false confession-mean
" false-of shame in our past, shame in our
sires, shame in our dead, which none but the
siliest fool can honestly feel, then, with all OF
the power given US by the God of truth, we
cry: Avaunt false South, avaunt Rotten
trunk upon cursed root, thy fruit must turn
10 ashes on the lip.
INTENSE anxiety exists at Cincinnati